Inside India’s expulsion of Bengali Muslims

India is expelling Bengali Muslims – stripping citizenship, detaining and deporting them to Bangladesh. The crackdown has spread nationwide, prompted by years of BJP propaganda and a news media all too willing to sell the story of a Muslim “enemy within”.

Why India’s election is such a big deal | Start Here

India is about to hold the world’s biggest election: 970 million voters will cast their ballots over seven phases of voting from mid-April to early June.

Start Here with Sandra Gathmann explains how the election will work, why Narendra Modi and the BJP are expected to win again, and how India is changing under them.

Prime Minister Modi inaugurates Hindu temple after decades-long dispute over site

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi has inaugurated a temple dedicated to the Hindu god Lord Ram on the site of a mosque in Ayodhya. His Hindu-nationalist BJP party has been hyping up the event ahead of the elections.

India: Anti-Muslim hate music

 Sandeep Acharya is a popular musician. Millions of users stream his songs online, and thousands of fans attend his concerts. He belongs to India’s Hindutva music scene - an Islamophobic scene that has been on the rise in India. Hindutva pop is often played when Hindu groups rally in India. Some songs have even sparked violence and riots.

India: Narratives of division and hate

 

A documentary edition of the show looks at rising intolerance and xenophobia in India as toxic narratives flood the airwaves and the internet.

India is at a dangerous moment.

The voices of Hindutva – Hindu supremacy – are ascending, spreading division and hate speech.

How a TV moment sparked a diplomatic crisis for India

 

A spokesperson from India’s ruling party triggers a foreign relations nightmare with a bigoted comment on live TV. Plus, Big Oil’s big lies.

An international backlash from more than 15 Muslim-majority countries is rattling India’s ruling BJP – and it all started with one comment on a news talk show.

Who is Narendra Modi? - India's path to becoming a world power

 

Many consider Narendra Modi to be the new strong man on the international stage. The right-wing nationalist has steered India's fortunes since 2014. He is the key player behind the new Indo-Pacific alliance against China.

Love jihad: India's lethal religious conspiracy theory

 

The mutilated body of a 24-year-old Muslim, Arbaaz Aftab Mullah, was discovered on a railway track near his home. His family believe he was murdered because of his interfaith relationship with a Hindu woman and that he is one of the latest victims of the 'love jihad' conspiracy theory, which has swept across groups of Hindu nationalists in India. The theory claims that Muslim men are seducing Hindu women and luring them into marriage in order to convert them to Islam. The claims are baseless, yet the consequences are real

Hate speech and online abuse: India’s growing extremism problem

 

Calls to kill minorities, weak mainstream media and negligent officials – India sees a rising tide of communalism. Plus, Russia’s ever-growing media blacklist.

Amid a spike in anti-minority hate speech, independent journalists in India uncover Hindu extremist gatherings and the truth behind a bizarre mobile app claiming to “sell” prominent Muslim women.

What's behind India's U-Turn on its farming laws?

 

India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said the government will withdraw a set of controversial farming laws. 

For more than a year, farmers across India have been holding mass protests, strikes and sit-ins.

Their actions have been against a set of farm laws that, they say, hurt their livelihoods.

Arrests and defamation: Bollywood in the dock in Modi’s India

 

Superstar Shah Rukh Khan is at the heart of the latest case of Indian authorities taking Bollywood to task.

Aryan Khan, the son of one of India’s biggest movie stars, Shah Rukh Khan, was charged with possessing and trafficking drugs. We take a look at the drug bust that tells a story of the conflict between the Indian authorities and Bollywood.

India's COVID task force pushes for nationwide lockdown as deaths mount | DW News

 

Scientists in India are accusing the government of ignoring warnings of new, more dangerous variants of the coronavirus. A forum of advisers says ministers failed to impose large-scale restrictions despite the alert in March.

Is Narendra Modi dismantling democracy in India?

 We challenge BJP spokesperson Syed Zafar Islam on India’s crackdown on dissent, and discuss the political and economic crisis in Lebanon.

India, long considered the world’s largest democracy, slid down the democracy scale this month, with Freedom House classifying it as “partly free”, and the V-Dem Institute calling it an “electoral autocracy” under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Why are India’s farmers angry?| Start Here

 

Hundreds of thousands of farmers in India have been protesting for months because of new farming laws they say will hurt them. But the government says it’s to fix an agriculture industry that everyone agrees needs fixing

India’s farmer protests: Grabbing the headlines, taking a stand

 

How the farmer protests in India are not just a political problem but also a PR problem for the Modi government. Plus, sports broadcasting in the age of a global pandemic.

Farmers’ protests in India keep growing despite Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government’s best efforts to contain the reporting.

Delhi’s deadly riots, explained by an expert

On December 11th, 2019, India’s parliament passed a controversial new law: the Citizenship Amendment Act. The law fast-tracks citizenship for migrants from three neighboring countries, specifically if they are Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis, or Christians. It conspicuously leaves out Muslims. Since the law was passed, it’s drawn widespread opposition and protests, and not only because it discriminates against Muslims. The law is also closely linked to another controversial initiative: the National Registry of Citizens, a citizenship list that could potentially leave millions of people, primarily Muslims, stateless.

BJP spokesperson defends Prime Minister Narendra Modi's handling of violence in Indian administered Kashmir.

The 2019 manifesto of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) states: "In the last five years, we have made all necessary efforts to ensure peace in Jammu and Kashmir".

But, if anything, the disputed territory is witnessing more violence, as 2018 was Indian-administered Kashmir's deadliest year in 10 years. At least 586 people were killed and, according to rights groups, 160 of them were civilians.

Both the United Nations and Amnesty International have accused Indian security forces of using excessive force in the region. The UN has specifically raised concerns about the use of pellet-firing shotguns by Indian security forces between 2016 and 2018, describing it as "one of the most dangerous weapons used against protesters".